The BBC committed a "serious breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the narrator of a documentary about the Gaza conflict was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by British broadcasting authority Ofcom.
An inquiry by the media regulator into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has concluded that the programme was "materially misleading".
The BBC's director general had already issued an apology, stating there had been "a serious error in relation to accuracy".
Ofcom has ordered the broadcaster to air a prime-time statement about its decisions.
"As this represents a major infringement of our regulations, we are ordering the corporation to air a announcement of our conclusions against it on the BBC's second channel at 9pm, with a date to be finalised," the statement read.
'Potential to Damage Credibility'
The regulator's statement stated: "Our investigation concluded that the documentary's omission to reveal that the narrator's parent held a post in the Hamas-controlled government was materially misleading.
"Consequently that the viewers did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their evaluation of the narrator and the information he presented.
"Trust is at the heart of the connection between a media organization and its viewers, notably for a public service broadcaster such as the public broadcaster.
"This oversight had the risk to erode the exceptionally strong degrees of credibility that audiences would have put in a BBC factual programme about the conflict in Gaza."
The documentary was removed from the BBC's streaming service in the month of February after the presenter's family links were revealed, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it breached the organization's content policies on factual correctness.
A corporation official stated: "The Ofcom ruling is in agreement with the findings of the internal assessment, that there was a significant failing in the programme in relation to the broadcaster's journalistic policies on accuracy, which aligns with clause 2.2 of Ofcom's Broadcasting Code.
"We expressed regret for this and we agree with the regulator's ruling in full. We will follow the directive as soon as the timing and wording are finalised."
